February 23, 2010

Bulgaria backs down on GM crop policy

Campaigning by environmental groups and the public has weakened the determination of the Bulgarian government to allow the cultivation of GM crops in the country.

In January 2010, the Bulgarian parliament voted, on a first reading, legislation allowing the release of GM organisms into the environment. But as the law awaited final passage, the Environmental Parliamentary Committee came under public pressure to accept a five-year moratorium on GM cultivation and a ban on testing near organic fields and beehives.

Environmentalists are now pushing for the new legislation to be dropped completely, rather than pass it with a five-year moratorium.

Bulgaria already has a 2005 law regulating GM crops, but national authorities recently declared it too restrictive and contradictory to European Union legislation to be competitive in the internal European market.